Hey all,

I'd appreciate some help/feedback regarding an open complaint with Virgin Holiday. My girlfriend and I traveled with Virgin to Orlando on the 10/10/2017 for 2 weeks for a total package cost of £3200.

To outline the situation, my girlfriend and I were forced to move hotel in our stay due to the extremely low standards at the Clarion Inn. I found myself becoming very ill on the 5th day of our holiday which was either caused by, or at least exacerbated by the room in which we were staying. On top of that, on the Saturday after we arrived the ceramic shelf mounted on the wall over the fell from the wall along with a large piece of tile and shattered on me whilst I was bathing. Luckily I wasn't injured, however if the shelf had fallen on me edge-ways it could have cut me with ease. When I contacted the management they seemed less than concerned and did not even ask if I had sustained any injuries. We were instructed that our room was unsafe and that we would have to move the next day to a different room. Due to how ill I felt and the seemingly blasè attitude of the management when dealing with the complaint I felt that we had no choice but to move hotel.

I rang Virgin in Orlando the next day - Sunday the 15th, and outlined the situation. I was advised there were very few hotels left available and our choices were another budget hotel or a significant upgrade. Subsequently I advised the agent that I was willing to pay for the upgrade due to my fears that another budget hotel would be as poor of a standard as the Clarion Inn. The new hotel was lovely but at no point before booking was I advised by the agent that there were separate resort fees and parking fees ($25 per day and $20 per day respectively) and that a large pre-authorisation would be taken ($500) which I know is standard at some of the larger hotels but was still a significant dent in our available cash. If I had known of the resort/parking fees I would have sourced a hotel myself as paying out around $400 extra on top of the upgrade fee (£600) caused us significant financial hardship whilst we were away.

After we had checked in to the hotel I called Virgin to query these fees as previously when I have traveled with them they waived these fees as I was a Virgin Holidays guest. I was advised that there was no problem and they would be waived. When I spoke to the hotel reception the next morning, they said that no one had contacted them regarding the fees. This was to be repeated with me calling Virgin in Orlando at least 5 more times over the coming week becoming more and more worried and stressed with each call. I called on the 15th, 16th, twice on the 20th and twice on the 21st. Each time I rang I was advised it would be fine and that the hotel would not charge me and that an email had been sent to the hotel to confirm. On at least two occasions I was told that I would get a call back from Virgin to let me know the issue had been taken care of. Of course I never received a call back.

On checkout as nobody from Virgin had contacted the hotel I was charged in full for all the fees. No one at Virgin contacted me until I returned home when I received an email on the 25th October asking if someone had been in touch with me regarding the fees and saying that they hope I didn't have to pay. The person sending the email was the same agent I had spoken to on at least 4 occasions about these charges as well as who booked the hotel in the first place, I would have thought that they were the person sorting these fees out! Once I replied to the email stating my displeasure it took Virgin in Orlando 10 days!! to reply to me! I was offered £175 to help cover come of the resort fees but due to the exceptionally poor customer service, the amount of times I had to call and keep calling when on my holiday and the long delay in reply when I returned I made a formal complaint to Virgin Holidays.

I raised my complaint on the 14th November 2017. I received an acknowledgement email and a further email in mid December advising it was taking more time to look into my complaint. I finally received a response today (16th January) more than 2 months after my initial email to them as well as a chaser phone-call and email. I got a standard response and an offer of £220 to help towards the resort fees.

I am a loyal Virgin customer. My girlfriend and I traveled with Virgin Holidays last year, I have a Virgin credit card and I have Virgin Media in my home, I am most definitely not a person who regularly complains and prefer to just get on with things but I'm having a hard time accepting such a paltry offer (in my eyes) when this has been dragging on for over two months and half my holiday was ruined.

I think i'm going to reject this claim as I don't think it's enough in all honesty. I would appreciate any help or advice from people who have had similar problems with Virgin. I know they have awful reviews of their customer services on trustpilot so i'm not sure why i'm surprised at the issues I've had with them.

Sorry for rambling and thanks for any help.